PEGGY TAPPER had always assumed that her youngest son failed his English exam because he hated the subject.

PEGGY TAPPER had always assumed that her youngest son failed his English exam because he hated the subject.

It was only 10 years later that he explained he had been unable to concentrate on the paper because he had just learned she had cancer.

He had not wanted to burden her any further and so kept his fears to himself.

Mrs Tapper felt guilty that she had focused so much on her own feelings and neglected those of her four teenage children, so much so that today she provides to other youngsters the listening ear that she could not provide her own. The Gwent Cancer Support's Young Persons project, now in its second year, offers people aged from 11 to 21 support if someone in their family has been diagnosed with cancer.

"The project was born out of my guilt," said Mrs Tapper, who has four children, now all in their 30s.

"My youngest son Richard was doing his A-levels when I developed bowel cancer in 1988. They never asked any questions and so we just assumed they accepted it and had no problems.

"It wasn't until around four- and-a-half years ago I was talking to my son and he told me why he failed his English.

"I thought it was because he didn't want to bother, but he told me it was just after he had been told and he couldn't understand the paper properly because he just couldn't concentrate. He's closest to us in a way because he's the youngest, so I was really upset that he hadn't felt he could come to us, but he thought I had enough on my plate fighting to get better so he didn't feel he could put his feelings on us so he bottled them up. I felt so guilty that I hadn't taken the time to talk to him, but I was so full up with myself. I was concerned the family were OK, but you don't really think of anyone else. I needed all my energy to battle against the cancer, but I still feel guilty that they badly needed attention."

Mrs Tapper looked into the support available for relatives of cancer sufferers and found there was nothing available for children in Wales.

At the time Ilora Finlay of Llandaff, an oncologist with Velindre and Holme Towers, was in the middle of work which showed that where serious youth offending by children was out of character 80% of them had experienced a serious event in their family. A large proportion of their parents had cancer and the children could not cope with it.

Now Mrs Tapper is providing what she calls a safe listening ear.

"A lot of young people will talk to their family, but they still like having someone to talk to outside the family to let their real feelings out without anyone getting upset," she said.

Mrs Tapper has been helped along the way with grants from organisations such as the New Opportunities Fund, which gave more than &#xA3;62,000 last year. All volunteers with the group are police-checked and the support is now extending to schools. Betws High School has set up a peer support group, with a group of students fully trained in listening skills to man a drop-in centre once a week during the lunch hour. They are supported by a Gwent Cancer Support volunteer, and two members of staff from the school are also fully trained so that the pupil volunteers are not left with difficult situations they cannot deal with.

"The majority of the kids are worried sick," said Mrs Tapper. "They have been told mum or dad is OK but they want to know if they are being told the truth, because their parents don't talk to them about it. They want to know if it's hereditary or even if it's catching, and these are all questions adults also ask."